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is blogging for you?
i’m not sure whether i should start a
blog, as i haven’t decided what i am
doing yet.
You needn’t have a plan before you
start blogging; often ideas will come
to you as you write. At first it might
be handy to address the idea of
blogging in itself; why you are even
considering blogging, and what you
hope to get out of the experience.
i can blog about blogging?
Why not? Nothing is off the table,
writing about why you’re writing
might help establish themes and
tones within your blog that last
throughout the year and beyond. As a
work in progress, your blog becomes
a part of your practice, and that
extra strand of enquiry can only be a
positive thing.
i’m not so sure whether my work is
interesting enough...
All artists feel this way about their
work at some point or other, and
especially during the early years of
their studies or career. For all of the
people that are not interested in your
work, there will be plenty that are.
How do i know they will read my
blog?
You don’t. There is no sure-fire way
of guaranteeing the ‘right’ readership
for your blog. But there is more to
blogging than receiving a thumbs-
ups; it can be about using writing to
help you understand your own work.
it would be nice to have some readers
though…
Posting regularly will increase the
visibility of your blog, as recent posts
are always gathered at the top of
the feed. The title of each post is the
first thing that anyone will read, so
appropriate or intriguing titling could
mean the difference between a reader
scrolling past your blog or taking a
longer look.
Some people think that it’s not ‘cool’
to look too confident in yourself.
Writing a blog about your studio
practice is not about self-promotion;
think of it more as a critique of your
own work, a space to come and think
out loud about the whys and whats of
your practice. You’ll soon forget about
what people think is cool or not.
Writing is not my forte, so what use
is a blog to me?
Blogging isn’t necessarily about the
quality of your writing; it is about
giving room to your thoughts, getting
them out of your head and onto the
page.
But won’t people steal my ideas if i
put them in the public domain?
As artists we are constantly discussing
new ideas with our peers, without
any guarantee that work like ours
won’t pop up in the studio next door.
The thing to remember is your reason
for making what you make and that
he motivations and decisions you take
in the creative process are entirely
yours. out of that will come the work.
There are other blog platforms, why
should i blog with a-n?
a-n blogs are populated exclusively by
artists and art and design students,
so your audience is already filtered to
people that want to read about and
discuss your work.
So i should only blog with a-n?
There is no harm in maintaining blogs
across a number of sites and different
providers offer different benefits.
Just remember to link back in order
to increase the traffic at your main
practice-based blog.
Trevor H Smith
, a recent Bath
Spa School of Art and Design
graduate and a-n blogger, helps
you decide.
Read Trevor’s blogs: